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Sarah Wildman

Sarah Wildman is a Prospect senior correspondent and a frequent contributor to the New York Times. She was a Spring 2006 Milena Jesenska Journalism Fellow at the Institute for Human Sciences, in Vienna, Austria, the first North American to receive this grant, and has been based in Europe since October 2005. Previously, Wildman was a contributing writer for the Advocate magazine and a Pew Fellow in International Journalism at the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies. Before accepting the Pew fellowship, Wildman was on staff at The New Republic. Her work has also appeared in Elle, The Christian Science Monitor, Travel & Leisure, Democracy: A Journal of Ideas, The Washington Post, Glamour, Marie Claire, Rolling Stone, Salon, The Jerusalem Report, and O (the Oprah magazine).

Recent Articles

Every year, in the Basque city of San Sebastian, demonstrators seeking independence gather hours before the commencement of "Semana Grande," a week-long festival of bull fights, outdoor concerts, and fireworks. In years past, it wasn't uncommon for Molotov cocktails to be lobbed from the crowd towards the police, who responded in kind. Last summer 20 protestors were injured -- hit by rubber bullets fired by the police when the crowd grew violent. The day before this year's protest, a Basque woman in her late twenties told me that, throughout her teens, violent clashes with the police took place frequently. She would be minding her own business in Parte Vieje, the old city, and suddenly a Pamplona-like stampede would come rushing down the street and sweep her up. She would then dive into the nearest bar, whereupon the barkeep would quickly rattle down the metal "We're closed" cage until the violence ceased. This year was the first Semana Grande protest since the violent Basque...

As Israel hunkers down into a fifth week of conflict in Lebanon, a group of activists in Jerusalem remain intransigent -- about World Pride, a week of gay rights demonstrations, teach-ins, and lobbying that rotates from city to city around the globe.* The event began on Sunday and ends this Saturday in the Israeli capital. "World Pride in Jerusalem is ...a high-drama event," says Hagai El-Ad, the director of the Jerusalem Open House, the group responsible for bringing World Pride to the city. "It will be the largest, most significant, and most diverse LGBT cultural festival of its kind ever to be held in this part of the world." World Pride Jerusalem has been a point of contention from its conception, long before the guns of July opened fire. Ultra-Orthodox Jews threatened violence. (At least one rabbi promised bloodshed ). The mayor of Jerusalem, an Orthodox Jew, tried to keep police permits from marchers and assemblers in the city. (The one significant concession to the broader...

Last week, on the night Spain met France in the World Cup, Madrid was, as always, stiflingly hot. Plaza Colon, in the center of Madrid, was teaming with red-shirted fans, restlessly waiting to watch the match live from Germany. Local bars were similarly packed and anxious. With tensions high for Spain to advance, few in this country were surprised by the “monkey” chants that the Spanish fans in Germany rained down on the multi-cultural French team -- the same team that Jean Marie Le Pen, head of the right-wing National Front party, chastised for having gone “overboard” with too many “players of color.” The racism here is not only a problem among the fans; it also extends into the highest ranks of the soccer establishment: Spanish coach Luis Aragones two years ago famously made a racist slur against Thierry Henry, a player for les bleus. If you've been watching the World Cup as obsessively as I have, you may have noticed the massive Say No to Racism banners that are displayed before...

I met Wendy Wasserstein only twice, though it was the first time that made an impact. It was the purest "meet a celebrity" moment I've ever had. Before I tried to get into parties, before I was “cool” enough not to care. And, truth be told, the moment I met her -- the drive I had to meet her -- had nothing to do with fame or celebrity. It was about recognition. In August 1991, I was 16 and about to be a senior in high school. My parents had friends with a house in the Hamptons who had invited us out for a long weekend. At the end of a lazy beach afternoon, I was sandy and frizzy and dirty. In the car I had taken off my soggy bathing suit and put on a pair of men's boxer shorts and a white Hanes T-shirt. My hair -- always big and frizzy and Jewish -- was in full revolt from the salt and humidity. My father was driving. I screamed, "STOP THE CAR." He braked, thinking something was wrong. He turned but by then I was half out of the Honda and pointing to a sign on a church that read "...

Tova Rosenberg (not her real name) lives in Rosh Pina, a little hippie town in the Galilee region of Israel that overlooks the Hula Valley. She is pretty in an unadorned way -- her long red hair is cut in a blunt straight style, her glasses are wire and speak to function over form, and her face is bare of makeup. She wears a zip-up sweatshirt and cargo pants, and she looks more like an American teen than a 26-year-old woman who has endured years of anxiety and bitterness. Rosenberg is a lesbian from an Orthodox Jewish family in Jerusalem. Her parents were hozrei b'tshuvah -- secular people who “returned” to faith in their late teens. It took her years to come out; she felt she was “evil” and went out with at least “20 guys” on pre-arranged matches hoping something would spark. When she finally did come out to her family, her mother tried to send her to “change therapy,” the Jewish equivalent of programs run by Christian fundamentalists in the United States. “[My mother] calls it the...